When zandtao discussed his practice before threshold in Ch3 his focus was on realignment, and this appears not to fit the two themes of practice:-
In fact alignment is a process that is common to both:-
Alignment that is free from restrictions Alignment with consciousness
Let me try to get into this to overcome any confusion that his practice might have caused in terms of the themes. As zandtao has emphasised throughout, we need to be concerned with our upbringing; to that end please reconsider the development model discussed in Ch3 - Addon A. As with any model zandtao has a proviso, and he wants to discuss it again to reinforce. Do not accept as truth any model zandtao describes. zandtao asks for the tentative approach again - tentatively accept the model and see if it improves your practice. After some time with the practice, allow your mindfulness to consider the model or additions to the model:- what does mindfulness say? Have you had insights into the model?
Let us consider an obvious additional stage between Prebirth and Early Life - Birth itself. At birth there is a radical outpouring of love - mother love, and this love is central to our path.
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Would that we could bring that pure mother love with us throughout life! As described in the model there is early life in which "seed-consciousness builds its host" through khandhas. Based on ego-evolve-consciousness with those khandhas there will have come some sort of restrictions as attachments - too soon to call them egos. But much more importantly at this early stage is the beginnings of the Sacred Wound. Both parents have a relationship with their paths and a relationship with the system-of-accumulation. However within the family dynamics these relationships impact on the newborn, so immediately that mother love becomes "impure", the level of impurity being a result of the family dynamics - how much of a loving family there is! Of course that "impurity" is by design depending on the ego-evolve-consciousness.
Basically alignment is an attempt to regain love - radical mother love - spiritual love - a fuller understanding of this love process will become clearer in Ch5. What the themes of practice ask you to understand is that over the years restrictions have built up that have restricted the seeker from love - distanced the seeker from the mother-love. Some of this distancing is natural ie khandhas and can be reclaimed, but the restrictions of ego-evolve-consciousness are more difficult. Zandtao described how this reclaiming occurred through his practice that he spoke of mainly as realignment.
Realignment and 2 Themes of Practice
Let's consider again this realignment in terms of the two themes. Through our upbringing of conditioning and conformity we build up restrictions to the state of mother-love as our seed-consciousness with its khandhas meets the societal infrastructure. These restrictions need to be released. Where are these restrictions held? They are created by ego-evolve-consciousness and held somewhere in the 3 tetrads of body, emotion and mind. We develop our practice to release these restrictions in two ways:-
as an individual restriction through the use of mindfulness and focus
as more "group" restrictions by alignment - realigning with the khandhas of seed-consciousness effectively removing non-aligned attachments built in the learning design of ego-evolve-consciousness.
It is this realignment that zandtao spoke of in Ch3 explaining it in terms of how it happened eg eschewing the world of work etc.
From Alignment to Consciousness
The second theme has a practice that is alignment more than realignment. From birth, consciousness fills up with contents. Initially we could think of "good" content with khandhas countering the "bad" content from ego-evolve-consciousness that could include shadow, fragmentation and trauma - at best dukkha. But of course the "bad" content is the "better" content because releasing that content/restrictions is why we are here - finding purpose by evolving design. When these restrictions are released we fill the contents with consciousness - in MwB the dhamma comrades of mindfulness, wisdom, concentration and sampajanna. With emptying of contents and filling with consciousness we realigned sufficiently, it was a sufficient transcendence. And what was the sufficiency? To reach autonomy. And in autonomy we refine our practice - improve our alignment through the themes of practice.
Autonomy arrives
Autonomy arrives. Over the years (whatever length of time) the seeker develops their practice, and this practice as described overcomes the conditioning of upbringing and daily life. Throughout this practice there will be moments of transcendence but when there is sufficient transcendence there is autonomy. Autonomy is a kind of culmination of transcendent practice. As with the warning in autonomy it is important to recognise the importance of prior practice but over time as the seeker becomes comfortable in their autonomy practice can change. Autonomy is a kind of culmination of transcendent practice. As with the warning in autonomy it is important to recognise the importance of prior practice but over time as the seeker becomes comfortable in their autonomy practice can change.
Beyond conditioning
Transcendence just means “beyond conditioning” - or at least that is how zandtao sees it. Whilst there was a buzz for zandtao around the time of crossing the threshold (a kind of bliss) there was no Stephen Strange; zandtao is unwilling to say that is true for everyone crossing this threshold. Whilst these joys (path rewards) are wonderful, it is not skilful to focus on them. What is more important is the meaning of this autonomy.
Alignment with dogma
A key point of autonomy is the ending of any alignment with a particular dogma - for zandtao this means Buddhism. From the point of autonomy or at least when zandtao began to understand his autonomy and feel confident in it. Zandtao did not follow Buddhist teachings, he followed what he had learnt. zandtao was never a follower of Buddhism, not even a follower of Theravada Buddhism, but a follower of Buddhadasa Buddhism. But with autonomy it is not even that. With his autonomy there is no conditioning - not even the positive conditioning of Buddhadasa Buddhism.
They can’t get at him
zandtao will go into attachment to dogma in more detail later. Having described this separation from following Buddhism he is going to mention an excellent word that Buddhadasa focussed on - atammayata. Buddhadasa translated it as “unconcoctability”, and this very much describes part of autonomy. “They can’t get at him”. This is a wonderful state to be in so long as he remains humble - they can’t get at him.
With the phrase they can’t get at him, zandtao is being a little loose but it’s OK if he is careful. With transcendence we are talking about going beyond conditioning. With conditioning we are talking about upbringing and ongoing conditioning, but with transcendence this conditioning does not affect the autonomous. Transcendence sees the conditioning but the transcended do not let the conditions affect them - they are unconcoctable. "They" strictly means the seeker is not affected by the conditioning (they - the conditions), but as a pathtivist zandtao recognises the overlap between conditioning and patriarchal conditioning. If zandtao confronts the patriarchy he is vulnerable to physical enforcement but in autonomy they can’t get at him - a major pathtivist plus.
Respect and Pali
This unconcoctability is reflected in the way that over his autonomous time meditation has become focussed on the 3 freedoms. It is worth considering the evolution of his practice to understand the meaning of this change to 3 freedoms, atammayata and autonomy. His wayward practice was described in detail in Ch3 but it was based around Buddhadasa’s MwB (Mindfulness with Breathing) - in MwB zandtao assesses Buddhadasa followed the foundations of mindfulness. Apart from the techniques, Buddhadasa was promoting reconnection to the Dhamma, building up the Dhamma Comrades, and releasing egos that arose from conditioning - there is far more than this in Buddhadasa’s MwB and teaching in general.
At this point it becomes necessary to show appropriate respect. zandtao is extremely grateful to all the teachers who have contributed to his path-learning - mainly Buddhist teachers. His practice was deeply grounded in their teachings, and his autonomy is greatly respectful. But as part of autonomy zandtao recognises that all practices can lead to autonomy, and that there is no one way. zandtao reached his autonomy through a practice that came from Buddhist teachers but other autonomous get there in different ways. But there is another problem that respect requires acknowledgement of. Theravadan Buddhism uses Pali language to describe many of its understandings but zandtao is now trying to avoid Pali terms because his use of those terms might cause insult to some Buddhist teachers.
The 3 freedoms that zandtao now uses as the core of his practice have arisen from understanding and interpretation of anatta, dukkha and anicca - 3 characteristics of Buddhism. zandtao refers to his current practice as freedom from attachment, suffering and clinging; some will see a closeness to the 3 characteristics and some might not. To avoid conflict and possible offence zandtao now describes these as freedom from attachment, suffering and clinging but out of respect acknowledges the teachings concerning anatta, dukkha and anicca.
Buddhadasa’s MwB promoted the Dhamma comrades - he described 4 - mindfulness, wisdom, concentration and sampajanna. Initially zandtao increased those Dhamma comrades to 5 for his usage - including compassion, agape or love as the 5th. Out of respect he still continued with the term “Dhamma Comrades” but then stopped. He now refers to them as graces or 4 directions of consciousness - love, wisdom, sila and truth and 3 skills of consciousness - mindfulness, focus and embodiment.
His practice history is respectful of MwB. Through MWB’s 4 tetrads he removed attachments in tetrads 1, 2 and 3, and reconnected with Dhamma through the Dhamma Comrades in tetrad 4. But with autonomy and transcendence he is mostly free from the upbringing and conditioning in tetrads 1, 2 and 3, and now embraces 7 graces through consciously-loving-and-evolving-consciousness. His personal history almost reveres Buddhadasa but maybe followers would be offended if what zandtao now practices were still referred to as MwB - he uses ZPAP as described in addon 3. And consciousness is not used the way Buddhadasa uses vinnana. So zandtao pays great respect to the teachers of his practice history but has changed terms out of that same respect. Dhamma and consciousness might be synonymous - check and see, there is a chapter on consciousness.
Focus on Restrictions
They still try to get at him - but with autonomy it is hard for conditions to be concocted. But in daily life consciousness still attaches and he works on restricting the residues of consciousness by enabling the freedoms from attachment, suffering and clinging. zandtao still uses the term khandha to describe that which is not consciousness - the foundations - the basis of the 1st 3 tetrads. Without these aggregates (khandhas) zandtao thinks there can be no life but he does not want the restrictions that attachment, suffering and clinging to khandhas can cause. But he knows that the khandhas must have limited consciousness (vinnana) - khandha-consciousness, or there is no life.
Conformity and Human-dependency need
Autonomy also brought freedom from conformity. From our upbringing we are taught to conform to society’s aims as different forms of wage-slave. Fitting in with wage-slavery requires conditioning and conformity. As part of our upbringing we recognise that conditioning brings attachment, and the egos that arise are formed in the khandhas of body/kaya, emotions/vedana, memories and perceptions/sanna, and mental operations/sankhara. These aggregates are human needs of the vehicle that carries consciousness. In our upbringing conditioning builds up attachment to these khandhas both naturally and as a matter of societal survival.
But how does conformity work? Also in our upbringing there is conformity, and this conformity is an attachment to a different human need - the need for human relationship or human dependency. So in our upbringing attachment to this human dependency leads to conformity through agreement and education. One might consider conformity a khandha inasmuch as upbringing builds attachment onto a human need to create conformity egos.
Human-dependency daily need
As an aside it is worth considering this human dependency daily need. With the help of Teal zandtao began to see this need when discussing beyond conformity. How does conformity arise during upbringing? What need does attachment cling to? When we consider the Buddhist khandhas (Hinduism/Jainism also have these skandas), they function as aggregates that attachment clings to - that is the nature of these daily needs. So how does attachment build conformity? By attaching to the need of human dependency.
Human dependency also builds up friendship, something that regularly occurs in daily life yet is not explained by the use of khandhas. Human beings need friendship at different stages in their life. Then there is also romantic love that is a mixture of this human-dependency daily need and the consciousness of love. All of this has connection to this basic daily human-dependency need that we attach to.
Let’s take this need a bit further whilst in no way fully investigating this need. In our upbringing this human-dependency needs leads to questions concerning approval. We start by seeking approval from parents - this also is greatly connected to the consciousness of love. We begin our lives by being almost totally attached to parental approval. As we grow and start to move out into the community through education this approval turns to peer approval and all the appalling problems of immature teen pressure where too much attachment is given to views of others. And this leads to approval in the world of work where we are constantly exploited by the need for approval by “the boss”.
So whilst the human-dependency need is not discussed within khandhas it is a fundamental part of the human aggregate, and something that zandtao describes as a daily need. As with the khandhas as we mature we give less and less attachment but recognise that throughout our lives there is this need.
There is also the spiritual understanding of interbeing put forward by Thich Nhat Hanh (and others?). This notion of interbeing is important in the understanding of connection. The flower does not exist separately, it is part of the interbeing that is nature. There is a seed that grows roots that feeds off the nutrition in the earth whilst at the same time needs the water of rain that comes from clouds, that comes from the formations of those clouds within the weather system - and on the interbeing goes.
In the same way no person is an island, we grow through interbeing and the daily need of human-dependency, we survive through human-dependency but we can also become too attached to this daily need. We detach from approval so that through the directions and skills of consciousness we evaluate and implement. And there are times of solitude where we detach from human-dependency to follow our paths and develop consciously-loving-and-evolving-consciousness, but throughout there is human-dependency and consciousness wanting to give back. Human-dependency functions as a daily need - as a khandha.
Integrated well-being as a need for the world of work
Usually zandtao describes this conditioning process of attachment as self-esteem - the need for self-esteem to survive in society. As we start to become adults as part of societal conditioning there is conformity. With conditioning there is attachment to khandhas, and this would imply that the need of human dependency functions as a khandha to be attached to when survival in society needs conformity. But once we put conditioning and conformity together we reach another problem - that of mental well-being. However this well-being at this stage when considered in terms of conformity could be seen as work-discipline. Based on our personal upbringing do we have work-discipline? As part of upbringing work-discipline arises from younger discipline such as parental discipline or school discipline, and is reinforced by society’s need for money to survive. So if we can hold down a job there is work-discipline, a form of well-being that arises from our conditioning and conformity. As part of this conformity there is also self-esteem where we measure ourselves by success at conformity and the amount of money we can make.
The combination of factors that produce work-discipline is a state of societal well-being. This societal well-being arises from conditioning and conformity - attachment to the khandhas and attachment to the human-dependency need. Let’s consider the khandhas and see where this well-being can arise. There is human-dependency and the khandhas of body, emotion, sanna and sankhara. These are all disjoint. Even at the level of societal well-being there is a need for integration. Normally integration is considered a deeply spiritual process but at this stage all we are looking at is the integration necessary to produce the well-being that would enable work-discipline. But there is a need for this well-being, this well-being is a separate need from the khandhas and human-dependency.
These two needs work as part of our upbringing. As part of survival conditioning attaches to the khandhas and these two needs so that we can fit into the world of work - accept being a wage-slave. There is an element of language confusion with zandtao using the term khandhas - an established Buddhist term, and two needs of human-dependency and integrated well-being. This needs to be clarified, and this clarification will occur after Sacred Wounds below.
Daily Need for Integration
Integration is often considered a spiritual process so why is zandtao describing it in the same way as a khandha? Why is integration being considered a daily need? When we consider khandhas they function separately as body, emotions, memories and mental operations. There is a need to bring these separate functions together in the human being. So vinnana or khandha-consciousness is not only required for each of the khandhas to function, vinnana also has an integration-consciousness that aggregates the separate khandhas into the human-being - without such integration the human does not function well. Described in this way, integration is a daily need of aggregation by vinnana or khandha-consciousness.
But when we see conditioning in terms of conformity then there needs to be an integration of the human with society and the needs of society - or the world of work. Aggregating the khandhas without any consideration of human-dependency and the societal need for conformity and the world of work just cannot exist, the aggregation must connect with society - must integrate with society.
But what does this integration have to do with the spiritual path? It is a requirement of conditioning and conformity that an individual has the work-discipline to accept wage-slavery - has the ability to integrate within the world of work, but this has limited connection to the spiritual path.
In this way integration is a daily need and can exist within conditioning and conformity - and can exist within the world of work. Human integration does not exist in isolation, it occurs within purpose. Conditioning and conformity define that purpose as societal - fitting into work-discipline, but when we talk of the spiritual path we talk of integrating with consciousness and not any separate human integration or any separate integration within the world of work.
There is always a need for integration. To begin with we integrate within the needs of the home and family love. As we grow that integration changes to integrating within education, then integration within the world of work and the conformity of marriage etc., and hopefully the individual matures and seeks integration with consciousness - the spiritual path. If we look at psychology this process of integrating has many aspects, and is not just spiritual. It is not unreasonable to consider integration as a daily need.
There is a strong positive side to seeing integration as a daily need, we cannot be deluded by seeing integrated well-being as being spiritual integration. Integration is a daily need that develops with purpose and develops with attachment to that purpose. If we integrate within family - but remain attached to that integration, we do not mature. If we integrate within family, education and childhood community we do not necessarily mature, similarly if we integrate within university. If we integrate within the conformity of the world of work, marriage and the communities they create, we do not mature. But the mature person integrates with consciousness whilst following their spiritual path - the spiritual purpose of integration - consciously-loving-and-evolving-consciousness.
Autonomy sees beyond conditioning and conformity, and gave zandtao a clearer understanding of human daily needs - seeing those needs in relation to society and the consciousness of the spiritual path; needs cannot be seen in isolation as a separate entity but within interbeing at whatever stage of life. This leads to a question that cannot be asked if one’s practice is not autonomous. Can we view the aggregation of a human being in isolation? Does this build separation? Do khandhas not require a context of society, interbeing and consciousness? And the much broader question, does patriarchy like compromise with individualist religions because of their individual focus?
Reacting to conformity
In adulthood as we become mature, we see the restrictions of conditioning and conformity. We can see the societal conformity in institutions such as marriage, religion, and perhaps nowadays well-being? What happens when we see conformity? We react. For many young people that could be socialism reacting to capitalism. For zandtao seeing conformity there was an immediate reaction to the world of work until his compassion decided on teaching. But there was also an eclectic reaction to teachings where he chose spirituality. He went through a period of dabbling - a piece from this tradition, a piece from that. This was his ego using reaction to conformity as a means of gaining control. In this period of dabbling he was learning about spirituality but there was no focus, practice or dedication - he barely got beyond the surface although he did at times.
It became necessary to conform to a tradition and a teaching because his dabbling was not getting deep enough. At the time there could be no way other than the way he chose. He chose Theravada Buddhism as described in Ch3 eventually becoming a follower of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu whose MwB became the core of his practice. For zandtao there needed to be conformity to such a tradition as the dabbling was going nowhere but the tradition was not enough there had to be practice. He needed to conform to his practice, and the teachings that led to his practice.
This was a continuation of the conformity of his upbringing, it was a continuation of natural survival - agreement (see Four Agreements addon 5) and conformity until there is the freedom to go beyond conditioning and conformity. There is the conformity of agreeing to societal institutions such as wage-slavery, marriage etc.; for this there needs to be self-esteem. Then there is a reaction to this conformity, as an idealism this might be socialism. It could be reacting as alternative lifestyle or dabbling spirituality. But there needs to be the discipline of a practice to train the mind, hence we have the practices that arise out of the traditions or religions. But these practices are also the self conforming to the tradition, institution or guru.
Breaking Free of Conformity
But autonomy breaks free of this conformity where the seeker has transcended both conditioning and conformity. Previously teachings had been internalised by the seeker whether the teachings of a tradition, religion or guru but the inner guide still conformed to the necessary discipline of the teacher. Then gradually (or otherwise) the inner guide builds up until there is sufficient autonomy to break free of the discipline behind their practice. The seeker's practice becomes their own, and is not the practice of tradition, institution or guru.
There is no disrespect in this autonomous breaking free, it is natural for consciousness to work itself free of conditioning and conformity. For zandtao the dabbling of spirituality would never have worked until he disciplined himself following the practice of Buddhadasa’s MwB. It is no disrespect for Buddhadasa that he breaks free, zandtao sees it as a testimony to his teaching, and even further respects the teacher who spoke of No Religion - despite that not being an aspect of Buddhadasa’s teaching that is lauded in Thailand.
Many ways to end conformity
zandtao has used the terms tradition, religion or institution or guru to describe the teachers of practice.As he has said, at the time for zandtao there could have been no way other than Buddhadasa Buddhism; but now he perceives that there are many practices that can lead to autonomy and consciously-loving-and-evolving-consciousness. A seeker has to be dedicated (conform) to the practice until s/he reaches the threshold of autonomy when through a process of enquiry s/he can balance what the conformed dedication has missed.
Equanimity
To begin this balance zandtao saw the lack of love and began a process of equanimity - love-wisdom balance. Buddhism is a wisdom tradition although it promotes love as compassion and metta. But as soon as zandtao crossed the threshold as a seeker he began questioning his own equanimity; he also questioned the love-wisdom balance of the institution - the wisdom religion. The love that zandtao felt was missing in his personal balance could simply have been the way he had lived and the way that he had received the teachings, and for zandtao redressing that balance was so important; his first autonomous book was Real Love.
This book began with examining love in his life as it moved from the trials and tribulations of romantic love and spiritual love - and then to later loving consciousness. But it moved to love in patriarchy with the help of bell hooks, leading zandtao to ask questions of Buddhist hierarchy - questions only as he knows not of their discussions. Wisdom without love lacks embodiment. Patriarchy can tolerate wisdom without embodiment as marginalised theory without practice. Is love not the fire that trunks wisdom into practice? Patriarchy restricts love because it knows love’s fire. Does patriarchy restrict love in wisdom religions? Is there a mutual tolerance of restricting love? Does the institution accept the restriction of love in order to survive?
Practice leads to secular
In Real Love zandtao answered these questions for himself, put the questions to the institution but his autonomy moved on. In Secular Path? he questioned whether there was one Buddhism and this helped him to understand the need for practice but there are many ways that lead to a secular autonomy; the practice on the path is secular and has a tradition or discipline but when the path becomes autonomous it is non-secular - no conformity or conditioning.
Seeing the Sacred Wound
So far zandtao has described autonomy in terms of transcending conditioning and conformity, and once this transcending happened there came balance as zandtao’s mind was not conditioned to follow Buddhadasa Buddhist dogma. This was balance that came from the freedom of autonomy.
zandtao took his equanimity - love-wisdom balance - further through the studying of 2 teachers - Nicola Amadora Love Unleashed and Teal Swan How to Love Yourself. Within this study of love zandtao became conscious of the perspective of Sacred Wounds. With autonomy came the transcendence to move beyond conditioning and conformity. In moving beyond, there was the lessening of attachment to emotions and repression that arose in his upbringing. At different times in adulthood bill had been conscious of anger towards aspects of his upbringing, transcending that anger zandtao became aware of two things:-
His anger at issues in his upbringing were exaggerated - too much attachment
Once he had transcended he could see how beneficial his upbringing had been in following his path.
These are characteristics of a Sacred Wound. Once he understood the nature of Sacred Wound, zandtao could understand the nature of bill’s suffering, and he also began to understand that bill was complicit with his Sacred Wound - often hiding behind the restrictions the Sacred Wound had given him. What he had railed against all his life, he now understood as education - these were lessons he was intended to learn.
Further investigation led him to greater understanding that we choose our parents, and whilst he still can’t love his now dead father he can love consciousness for the way we can choose our parents and the way that suffering was minimal despite how much attachment bill gave it.
zandtao began to see the Sacred Wound as a holy khandha with so many attachments from upbringing that he began to release throughout adulthood eventually leading to the gratitude for the holy khandha as a vehicle that led to his path.
From khandha to daily need
Khandha is translated as aggregate so what aggregates? Consciousness as attachment, and consciousness can attach to the khandhas. In our upbringing attachment builds leading to self-esteem. zandtao tends to see the khandhas as places where the attachment builds into the self-esteem.
But with autonomy came the seeing of the transcending of conformity that attached to the human-dependency need. With this human-dependency we attach and attach until we agree with the conformity, yet with our practice we release these attachments seeing less and less the need for conformity.
With conditioning and conformity came the need for complicity with work-discipline. As we have described above this required integrated well-being with work-discipline as the objective. How can mind, emotions, body, human-dependency come together in the world of work without some form of integration. Normally integration is seen as spiritual but if the objective is to be complicit with patriarchy then this is not spiritual. It is psychological. We need self-esteem in daily life, and we need mental well-being to accept wage-slavery. These are societally beneficial but they are not spiritual - what has been called McMindfulness - Google meditation - see addon.
These needs of human-dependency and integration are essential for appropriate conforming to society, as explained above a human is not an isolated individual but functions within different social groups - family, school, uni, workplace etc. If we look at the khandhas they are not seen in relationship to such groups but oly as individual development. As such khandhas are not a full description of human needs but they are a sound decsription of personal development - in some "isolated" sense. For a fuller description we need to consider human-dependency and integration.
Nit-picking?
Is this nit-picking? For zandtao the khandhas were key ways in which he could recognise where ego attached to. Above zandtao described approval in terms of attachment to human-dependency; recognising approval as egoic would be a good attachment to release. Integration is always a good process even if it is only to integrate for well-being in the place of work. Knowing the purpose of the integration need would be useful in terms of the path.
zandtao first came across the khandhas when Buddhadasa asked the anatta question - is there anything else other than khandhas? For completeness zandtao would now answer that with human-dependency and purposive integration, these are human aspects needed to fit into society - rather than personal - rather than connected with atta, so they don't conflict with the purpose of the question. But for zandtao it feels better to include these basic needs.
Sacred Wound as daily need
And then we have the more spiritual need of the Sacred Wound - that zandtao has previously called the holy khandha. In our upbringing there is much attachment caused by the Sacred Wound. This needs integrating to allow for the well-being of accepting wage-slavery and the more spiritual forms of integration. But that is also not the purpose of the suffering of the Sacred Wound, that purpose is spiritual. Through our practice we release attachment to the Sacred Wound enabling us eventually to become autonomous - and see benefits of a Sacred Wound.
With all of these - khandhas, the holy khandha of the Sacred Wound, the human-dependency need and the integration need that becomes conformity - attachment is built up during upbringing, reinforced in adult life, and released by practice. zandtao cannot rewrite dogma so for his descriptions he is now not going to use the term khandha but is going to describe the 6 daily needs - 3 vehicle needs of body, emotions and mind (zandtao uses mind to mean both sanna and sankhara - memories, perceptions and mental operations), the human-dependency need, the need of integrated well-being, and the need for Sacred Wound to guide us into our path. In our upbringings we attach to these daily needs, they are reinforced in adult life, but as we develop our practice we release attachment to these natural needs. These are the restrictions we release through the three freedoms optimising their needs through minimal attachment in autonomy.
It is not weakness in a tradition
When autonomy took zandtao into looking into the equanimity of love-wisdom balance, he was not being critical of Buddhadasa; zandtao could not possibly see loopholes in who he was as a seeker and a great teacher. He was seeing weaknesses in what he had received. He did go on to question the institution because an institution is vulnerable in being defensive. zandtao has no doubts that Buddhadasa understood equanimity, love-wisdom balance and any other gaps in zandtao’s own received teachings and understandings. If zandtao had access to Buddhadasa he is sure that Buddhadasa could provide answers to any question he asked. What matters with autonomy and the teachings connected to practice is that the seeker is asking the questions and is seeking answers despite the tradition. In autonomy the seeker finds their own answers.
In this chapter zandtao has discussed the addition of 2 daily needs to the khandhas - as well as adding Sacred Wound to this consideration of needs or khandhas. Taking Teal’s advice he has added this human-dependency need, does that mean the Buddha, Buddhadasa or other Buddhists do not see such a need. Of course not. Making friends seeking approval, conformity or any other description that might be associated with a human-dependency need would be coped with by consideration of some other aspect of the tradition such as metta or compassion or empathy - brahma-viharas. The point is that in autonomy zandtao is becoming conscious of the answer, and as such he is consciously-loving-and-evolving-consciousness.
It is notable that the khandhas are to do with the individual or person, and not concerned with relationship, societal or otherwise. It is possible that when we discuss individual without relationship, we risk separation; but for Buddhadasa reconnecting with Dhamma has anything like that covered. But as a seeker zandtao likes adding the needs, and if he were advising about meditation he would take this approach. He would also ask of the institution whether theory involving khandhas risks individual separation. zandtao knows that institutions are vulnerable because of their defensive institutional egos so he asks. But he knows that within the tradition there are answers. .zandtao is not asking for the “Buddha to add 2 khandhas”. As a seeker in the stage of autonomy, finding a conscious answer is what matters. The tradition has its own answers but instead of being dependent on the tradition autonomy makes the seeker more conscious. It was important to be dedicated to the discipline to move beyond eclecticism or dabbling but the path leads to a seeker’s autonomy - whatever the tradition or guru. It is the consciousness of autonomy that matters, and we will look at consciousness in the next chapter - with GabiK.
Ch4 Holding Space
Overriding Directions
What do we need when we are re-evaluating the condition with our mental factors? Wisdom, there is little point in re-evaluating the conditions that have initially led to the path’s trigger if the new decision is not wise.
To release attachment on one level is a straight-forward process, become aware of the attachment, examine the conditions and wisely let go of the attachment. In describing this release we have to look carefully at what enables the letting go - we have used abilities of consciousness - awareness, concentration, and embodiment. And in this situation we have asked that the overriding direction of the decision be wise.
But there is another overriding direction for decisions and that is agape - spiritual love. If decisions are just wise there is imbalance, equally if decisions are just loving there can also be imbalance. As part of our abilities of consciousness we need also to develop a love-wisdom balance. When we release attachments the process is simply that of letting go. But it is not enough to see practice as this release, it is also necessary that we have developed abilities of consciousness - awareness, concentration and embodiment - that can use love-wisdom balance to make the decision that releases the attachment.
And the final overriding direction to be considered is that of sila. Sila is a Buddhist word that has a specific meaning in terms of the Noble 8-fold path of the 4 Noble Truths, but it is not the specific Buddhist meaning that zandtao is looking for. Sila is often translated as moral integrity - avoiding moral codes or rules such as the 10 commandments. But the reason zandtao likes the word sila is because Buddhism is a nature religion, and the best way zandtao has of looking at this ability of consciousness is that it is a natural moral integrity. When the path arises it brings with it a natural moral integrity of sila-consciousness So the 3 overriding directions that apply to the decision-making for the release of attachments are love-wisdom and sila.
Sila - Ability of consciousness
We have discussed abilities of consciousness that are needed. Firstly we have awareness and concentration that enables us to grasp the conditions and attachment for consideration. To process the decision we have the overriding directions of love-wisdom and sila that the mental factors measure against. And we finally have embodiment where once the release has been made, that decision is embodied in daily life.
Above we described the development of egos “When these imitated behaviours become repeated we recognise this repetition, and make a decision that we should repeat these behaviours if conditions associated with these behaviours arise. This decision is paying attention or applying consciousness to the conditions and the resulting behaviour; at a certain point when there has been many repetitions these conditions and behaviours become recognised as part of our character - and become egos; this is attachment to ego.” This attachment is described as arising from imitated behaviours during upbringing. When the path triggers consideration of an attachment, then it is quite conceivable that such an attachment is brought into question through not being loving, wise or moral.
Let us consider the environment of upbringing where these imitated behaviours are developed. It is quite likely to be in the upbringing in which a family works in the system-for-the-rich. In that situation the father and mother have accepted the world of wage-slavery, and the decisions in their work environment will be made by a code of practice that would benefit the system-for-the-rich. Such a code could well be considered greedy. In the intro-vision, the system-for-the-rich was described as a vision-with-delusion. At the same time there is a need for a diminishing of other peoples. This could start with mentalities such as a dog-eat-dog world. There could be the propaganda in the world that ensures that during war the opposition are created as demons. German friends bill often associates with on a personal level were killed by his father’s generation and vestiges of demonisation existed when he was growing up. If such conditioned behaviours were measured against benchmarks of love-wisdom and sila, they would not be part of our upbringings. So when our awareness and focus grasps a problem, and analyses conditions based on love-wisdom and sila, then such attachment is not warranted and we let go. On a practical level letting go might not be so easy, hence the importance of embodiment - the importance of putting into practice in our daily lives understanding that arises through abilities of consciousness.
Looking at consciousness
We have reached a stage of understanding where if we don’t examine consciousness it will be confusing. Consciousness is huge and this is in no way an attempt to define consciousness; zandtao sees such definition as an impossibility. What we can do is consider the functioning of consciousness in order to help our practice. .zandtao is going to consider this functioning in 3 broad loosely-described areas - brain-consciousness, mind-consciousness and Unity-consciousness, and ask how these relate to practise?
So far in our description of the release of attachment we have spoken of habits - habitual attachment, contents of consciousness with releasing attachments and abilities of consciousness used to release attachment. Good habits are mostly connected with brain-consciousness. Are we aware of how we walk? At our most conscious we might choose a style of walking, but we do not consciously think of how we use our walking muscles. Perhaps in old age we become more conscious of knee involvement in walking but we basically walk as a habit; zandtao associates that habit of walking as a function of brain-consciousness. There is a normal functioning of walking that is part of brain-consciousness but if there is an event that is not-normal it moves outside of brain-consciousness to mind-consciousness for consideration. .zandtao sees habits as part of brain-consciousness, and as such he does not become aware of these habits as part of his practice - mostly.
Brain-consciousness also works with perception of events - a kind of sorting-house. As we move through daily life all kinds of events are happening around us. As zandtao now looks up from the computer he can see all around him. But when his focus is on writing he does not see around him. But the senses are still working and brain-consciousness examines that input and releases those sense-events as “not worthy of current attention”. The mind-consciousness of zandtao is currently paying attention to writing and brain-consciousness falls in line with that in its processing of sense events. One might think of this sorting as a form of habit - habitual sense-events happening around that are not worthy of attention.
TV crime-drama. We have many versions of the same event because each individual’s attention is on different things. If the police were able to access the brain-consciousness of all witnesses they would be similar and a true description, but there is no memory - no attachment; brain-consciousness sorts and releases te sense-event. Different descriptions of the sense-event are recalled because of the different attentions.
So we reach an important understanding:- mind-consciousness deals with matters worthy of attention, so when the path triggers concern about an attachment it becomes worthy of attention in mind-consciousness. We have already described the process of letting go of attachment, and as we do that we are releasing contents from consciousness - attachments in mind-consciousness. In mind-consciousness we apply the 3 freedoms of releasing from attachment to ego, from clinging and from suffering - different contents of mind-consciousness.
But in order to release attachments we have used abilities of consciousness - awareness, concentration, embodiment, sila and love-wisdom balance. These belong to the 3rd consciousness - Unity-consciousness, but can be aligned with through mind-consciousness. Our paths are attempting to bring us back to Unity-consciousness so it triggers events that lead to releasing attachment. To release attachment or restriction we need the abilities that arise from Unity-consciousness, the path is taking us towards that Unity-consciousness.
Unity-consciousness brings with it the plus side of spirituality; in Unity-consciousness we have bliss especially with firstgrace - less so later as the spiritual path becomes more of our daily awareness. There are a number of words associated with connection to this Unity-consciousness. Eckhart uses presence, many Christians use the word grace. Look for presence in your experience, it is a way of recognising Unity-consciousness.
.zandtao sees these abilities of consciousness as graces - awareness, concentration, embodiment, sila and love-wisdom balance, and he is glad to get away from the clumsy “abilities of consciousness”. As we develop Unity-consciousness we develop graces. We might hear of people “expanding consciousness spiritually”; as we develop Unity-consciousness there is a feeling of expansion. In a sense there is an expansion but zandtao prefers to describe it as an end to restriction. As part of our conditioning we have been restricted to functioning in brain-consciousness and mind-consciousness, as we transcend conditioning - as our paths trigger, we increasingly become part of Unity-consciousness developing the graces that enable us to release attachment - end restriction. Our practice is the tool we use to develop the graces and release attachments.
Let’s look more at how understanding these 3 functional delineations helps us with our practice. Firstly we have the triggers of the path that are how the path begins to fulfil its function - aligning with Unity-consciousness. But we can only control to some extent brain-consciousness and mind-consciousness. So what the triggers work on is helping the mind-consciousness align with Unity-consciousness. That is an important element of our practice - aligning with Unity-consciousness.
What the triggers do is to make the mind aware of attachments that need releasing, and using the graces we can release attachments. When we discussed the 3 freedoms we became aware of what these attachments can be so that we can free ourselves from the restrictions of attachment to ego, clinging and suffering. Where do these restrictions come from? Upbringing. In our upbringing we learn to cling to attachments that are the agreements we make with the intro-vision - agreements that we make with the system-for-the-rich.
In a sense, during upbringing our brain-consciousness encroaches into mind-consciousness. Through our conditioning we develop habits about things that the system-for-the-rich wants us to develop, things which nature has designed for us to use mind-consciousness to resolve. It is these habits, these attachments that the mind needs to work on in order to align with Unity-consciousness. Once the mind-consciousness is free of these contents, it is freer to align with Unity-consciousness.
Basically in our upbringing there is a process of conformity that involves restricting mind-consciousness with attachments, attachments that we learn in order to conform to this system-for-the-rich. At some point in adult life our paths begin with their purpose of aligning with Unity-consciousness. If there is sufficient readiness for this alignment we recognise triggers that indicate attachments that need to be released. Then begins a process of alignment through whatever practice you choose so that you can get as close as possible to connecting with Unity-consciousness.
Essentially mind-consciousness needs to examine the habits we have formed in our upbringings to see those that have been developed by conditioning and those that are intended for brain-consciousness. To distinguish between the two attachments zandtao uses attachments that the 3 freedoms need to address and habits that are part of the usual purview of brain-consciousness. Because throughout our lives we live within the conditioning of the system-for-the-rich, we need to be aware of attempts to form and reform attachments as part of that living in the system-for-the-rich. Unity-consciousness gives us the graces to help in our practice of not reforming attachments.
To put this in a simple way we need everything in its place. We need to realign with Unity-consciousness. To do this we need to free up mind-consciousness so the mind-consciousness can fulfil its purpose of alignment. As we free up the mind-consciousness then we recognise what is the purview of brain-consciousness and don’t use mind-consciousness functioning to deal with brain-consciousness functioning. We have our practice to align mind-consciousness.
Core Components
At this point we start to look at details in practice, and those details are for every seeker to describe for themselves. Later in this chapter zandtao will give the example of those details for his practice but to begin with he will examine what he calls core components of practice. These core components are written with the purpose of guidance and are not an actual practice. Are these guides within your own practice?
brain-consciousness and mind-consciousness
How do these consciousnesses fit in with the restrictions? For zandtao it began with seeing the connection between brain-consciousness and clinging. Consider natural instincts that are provided for our survival. Rather than letting go of instinct we cling to it - typically clinging to lust. Lust becomes “hard-wired” as neural pathways of brain-consciousness. Nothing is permanent so mind-consciousness can start a process of releasing the neural pathways. With mind-consciousness we make the unconscious lust part of our awareness, then we let it go. To be fair, how we release lust is a major individual struggle and is an ongoing part of meditation releasing restrictions. As part of our autonomous practice we must also investigate whether attachment and suffering have similar hard-wired neural pathways.
We need to bring mindfulness into mind-consciousness to prevent restriction from arising but we also need mindfulness in mind-consciousness to make the changes to the hard-wiring of the neural pathways - start in mind-consciousness to change brain-consciousness. Out of brain-consciousness we make conscious the egos, shadow or otherwise, once bringing them into mind-consciousness we release them. But doing this once is not enough because there has been a lifetime of reinforcement of these restrictions that have “hardened” into egoic attachments, egoic suffering such as anxiety, and egoic clinging such as the spectrum of addiction to alcohol, drugs, lust and others connected to instinct.
Graces - Directions and Skills of Consciousness
Our practice also involves graces - we now have 7 Dhamma comrades - 4 directions of the spiritual imperatives (or directions) love, wisdom, moral integrity and truth and 3 skills of mindfulness, focus and embodiment. There needs to be an ongoing process of replenishment and then embodiment as integration and in daily life. Through consciousness "coming into us" during daily life, we build up restrictions as the residues of the characteristics of consciousness - the 3 freedoms. These residues can form the basis for attachment, suffering and clinging unless we release them through the skills of mindfulness and focus. But releasing is not enough we fill up again with the 4 directions of love, wisdom, moral integrity and truth as consciousness which directs our daily lives - embodiment. This is autonomy-in-action.
Solitude not Abidance
This vision, thezeer, was to arrive at abidance where all the factors came together and there was abidance producing autonomy - that seemed to be the vision. But when it came to zandtao writing what happened in practice it felt dishonest to call it abidance. The external factors came together - his limiting health, no more teaching vocation, no more beach community, a greater solitude, but in retrospect it does not feel right to call this abidance. But there was a greater dedication in this solitude - sufficient to cross the threshold of autonomy.
The first important event that brought clarity after this coming together in solitude was his Centring Summer LINK - his first contact with Teal. This was a deep centring and consolidation through the chakras, led to the 2nd part of the Manual and the first recognition of pathtivism - discussed later.
It is the solitude that led to autonomy - not any sense of 100% abidance (his mistaken perception of vision). He did not abide 100% - with warts’n’all there has never been 100% abidance. After these factors came together he was alone - no factors of community, vocation or anything else other than study and writing. Out of the Centring Summer grew Viveka-Zandtao - a study of solitude, and through that z-quest came the Buddhist study that led to autonomy - going into the deeper study of Thay led to the end of Buddhism as a source of dogma. An end to calling himself a Buddhist - autonomy.
Let zandtao reiterate and stress the importance of this practice, and the focus on the Holy Khandha or Sacred Wound. At the arrival of firstgrace a new seeker might well be confused; this might well be the first awareness of any path experience. Where does this awareness take the seeker? And out there, there are so many different ways up the mountain - so many different theories. And younger seekers look to theories as being most important because they have just left education. But it is the disciplined work of practice that matters the most. Unfortunately no practice makes sense unless it is backed by theory, and that opens the gate to ditthi proliferations - just so many ideas and theories. And all of these theories confuse as they take away from the focus on practice.
Atammayata is a Pali word that has no good translation - a state of non-concoctability was Buddhadasa's translation that he was uncomfortable with; but it is so important to understand the meaning of this state. We have reached this state if we have released all restrictions and don't allow new restrictions in. From that position we are not affected by conditioning or society's pressures to conform, and there just remains the practice of holding space for the skills and directions of consciousness - skills as mindfulness, focus and embodiment and directions as love, wisdom, sila and truth.
Through our practice we can feel the release of restrictions - and the need to hold space:-
Understanding Alignment as Practice 
Alignment that is free from restrictions 
His anger at issues in his upbringing were exaggerated - too much attachment
